Locked On Penguins - Daily Podcast On The Pittsburgh Penguins - Losing one game against the Sabres? SEASON'S OVER!!

Episode Date: April 19, 2021

After not having an episode on Friday, Hunter is back on Monday to recap both of the Pittsburgh Penguins games this weekend as they had a split against the Buffalo Sabres. It was their first loss against the Sabres this season (they're now 5-1 against them) and on cue, the fanbase freaked out. Hunter explains why this team is a playoff lock while also talking about what needs to be cleaned up. What are the problems plaguing the PK still? Is Tristan Jarry being too aggressive playing the puck? He also talks about Jason Zucker's performance and teases an upcoming segment about him as he's been a hot topic within the fanbase. All that, plus talk on the power-play, Jared McCann, and much more on this latest episode of Locked On Penguins.Listen to The Ultimate Mock Draft 2021 presented by Audacy and the Locked On Podcast Network. April 19th-26th. Follow the feed today! Support Us By Supporting Our Sponsors!BetOnline AGThere is only 1 place that has you covered and 1 place we trust. Betonline.ag! Sign up today for a free account at betonline.ag and use that promocode: LOCKEDON for your 50% welcome bonus.Built BarBuilt Bar is a protein bar that tastes like a candy bar. Go to builtbar.com and use promo code “LOCKED15,” and you’ll get 15% off your next order.Rock AutoAmazing selection. Reliably low prices. All the parts your car will ever need. Visit RockAuto.com and tell them Locked On sent you. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Your Locked-on Penguins. Your daily podcast on the Pittsburgh Penguins. Part of the Locked-on Podcast Network. Your team every day. Hello, everyone, and welcome to this Monday afternoon edition of the Locked-on Penguins podcast. I'm your host, Hunter Hodes. Remember to follow me on Twitter at Hunter Hodes. Follow the shows Twitter at L-O- underscore Penguins.

So welcome back to another week of this podcast. podcast. A big week, especially for the Penguins. Remember, today's episode is brought to you by Bilpar. You go to Bilbar.com and use promote code locked 15, and you'll get 15% off your next door. Remember, that's at Bilbar.com. So yes, big week coming out for the Penguins. We will actually have five full episodes this week. I am back from my vacation. I'm probably not going on a vacation for at least a couple months now. I moved up my vaccine shot to this Thursday. So if you are not vaccinated, just sign up whenever, honestly, because I believe anyone that is in the United States now can make a vaccine appointment as early as today,

especially if you are in Virginia, anyone's 16 and over in the state that I am in, which of course, like I said, is Virginia, you can now sign up anytime and get your vaccine. But I have my first shot this Thursday, probably in the next few weeks I'll have my second shot. So I'm excited for that. But, you know, this is a hockey podcast, so let's get into it with what happened with the Penguins this weekend. They split the two games against the Buffalo Sabres. and yes, I knew as soon as the Penguins lost, that second game to Buffalo, all the hot takes were going to come out. I'm here to tell some of you all that maybe listen to this podcast or some other people in the Penguins fan base,

chill the fuck out. And I'm serious. Like, people just need to get a grip. It is very hard, and I mean very, very hard to go 8-0 against a singular team during a season. I mean, yes, I understand the Capitals went 8-0 against the Devils this year, but that is very hard. to do. Penguins had won five straight against Buffalo, but also, if I may, Buffalo has won, I believe, six of their last 10 games. They actually went into Washington and beat the Capitals by the same score. They beat Pittsburgh yesterday, 4 to 2. And that was on the road. This wasn't a game that they won in Buffalo.

They went into Washington and kicked their ass. So, were there any hot takes from Caps fans after that game? I mean, maybe so, but it wasn't as bad as from what I saw yesterday. I mean, I saw some people on the fan base saying, well, you know, the Penguins got to have a grip on their playoff spot. It's like, there's still seven points up on the New York Rangers. There's 11 games to go. They would have to be a full-on bona fide collapse during these last 19 days that are left in the regular season for the Penguins to actually not make the playoffs.

There really is no threat to them right now. Boston is most likely going to get in. Islanders are going to get in, and then Washington is going to get in. Maybe the Rangers are trying to make a run, but they also just won four straight games against the Devils, and now the Penguins will have three straight games against them, starting on Tuesday at PBJ Panserina before having two against Boston. So the points are there for Pittsburgh to bank these next three games,

and the Rangers will face much stiffer competition over this next week. They're not going to be getting a lot of the Sabres and the Devils, I don't think, in their last 10 to 11 games. So people just need to get a chill pill. I understand the effort level was not there yesterday. I mean, they've also struggled, I think, a lot in afternoon games. So you would have liked to see them play, at least a little bit better yesterday,

but also three games in four nights, people. It's very hard to do. The schedule is so condensed this season. I remember when they lost to New Jersey in overtime, PPGP and Serena, everyone was like, oh, wow, you know, the Penguins really stunk in that game. And we should be really, this is how you lose a playoff. After that, they went and won, I think, what, five in a row,

basically had points in five, six straight games. I mean, they basically said, okay, whatever, the parts of the fan base. And that's what I think they're going to do here as well. people just need to chill out. It is one game. It is not going to break through season. This is still a playoff team.

And that's basically that. You know, they're not going to have many more games during the home stretch of the season where they play that flat. And yes, you have to give credit to the Sabres. They actually played hard after they got rid of Taylor Hall, Eric Stahl, Brandon Montaun, a couple others. Some of their young players and even some of their veterans have actually decided to play hard. Don Granado has done a very nice job there as the interview. head coach. It would not surprise me if he is their full-time head coach next season. He has that team playing hard. These kind of teams are not just going to wilt over and die. They were doing that

under Ralph Kruger, but I think we need to have a talk about how they didn't want to play for Ralph Krueger. And I don't even think they gave a shit about playing under him. It was just that bad. And now they're playing more loose. It's more carefree. And you're seeing the results that are coming from Buffalo. I mean, they beat Philadelphia twice in the last couple weeks. They beat Washington, Boston, now they beat Pittsburgh. So for all the other fan bases, maybe outside of Philadelphia, are they saying that the season's over and the Penguins are not in the playoffs, or the capitals or the Islanders or whatever?

No, they're not because all those teams are very comfortably in a playoff spot. So I really just had to take a few minutes and rant about that because this fan base is so freaking miserable 24-7, 365. I promise everyone it is going to be fine. They have three games up against the Devils this week who, you know, they played well in their last two before two massive games against Boston. Then they have the two big ones against Washington and then two against Philly. And then they actually closed the season against the Sabres and Pittsburgh.

So the Penguins will still have an opportunity to potentially go seven and one against the Sabres this season, which is pretty freaking good. If you can get 14 out of 16 points against a team in the division, I mean, they got 12 out of 16 points against the Islanders this year, and they're one point ahead of them right now. They also got 12 out of 16 points against the Rangers. Imagine the Penguins only went four and four against the Rangers this year. It would be a lot closer of a race than it is right now with the Penguins, like I said, being seven points up.

So it's okay. I know a lot of people are going after Jason Zarkler. I have an idea for a segment on one of my shows coming up. I think I'm going to have one person debate for him and then one person debating against him, especially as it goes for the expansion draft, because that's going to be a really interesting decision for the Penguins as that process gets closer. because I actually think you can make a claim for both sides. I really do believe that. So I think I'm going to have that coming up maybe later this week

or potentially, Nick's, we just got to make sure both of the people, excuse me, can come on at the same time. I did like his goal yesterday. It was a very nice shot, past Okarsky, but everyone is going to remember the bad thing that happened with soccer. And for some inexplicable reason, he decided to pass on a very easy 2-1 where he should have shot the puck. I mean, the Sabres were over-plan.

the pass so bad on that sequence, excuse me, and for some reason, Zulker thought that the pass was open and he made it and, of course, the play went the other way and the penguin scoring chance was nullified. If he would have shot the puck there, I really do believe that the penguins would have gotten right back into that game. There's also a couple other moments in the game where, you know, you don't really see Sidney Crosby miss a tapin. The way he missed that, basically it was like five feet away from the net. And Sid just totally put it like five, ten to feet wide or something. like that. Really something you don't see him miss very often. Excuse me, I think probably 90%

of the time he scores on that. I think if he does, it would have been a tie-game and who knows what could have happened after that. But, you know, overall, just with that game, not a good performance for the Penguins, but it's also not the end of the world. They still have the Sabres two more times. They have the Devils three times coming up, as I've said, probably five million times in the first seven minutes of recording this podcast. No, this is not doom and gloom. They are still only one point out of second place. They are three points out of first place. And I get it. You know, this was a prime opportunity for the Penguins to get within a point of first place in the East Division with the game in hand on Washington. I totally get that. But also with the same, just speaking at the same

time, does everyone really want to play the Boston Bruins in the first round of the East Division playoffs? I mean, you'd probably hear crickets if you were speaking at a school or a show full of Penguins fans as, you know, they probably do not want to play Boston in the first round. You know, I'd much rather have my chances going up against the Islanders or the Capitals in their first round. Preferably, the Capitals, honestly, I think the Penguins still match up against them really well, especially at defense and goal. And I think the Penguins forward depth is also better than Washington's as well. But we're going to have more on this game coming up in the next segment.

Well, a little more from this game coming up in the next segment because there really wasn't much else to write home about in this game. And we're also going to talk about Saturday's game a lot more in this episode. as well. But before we do that, it is time to talk about Blue Nile. This episode is brought to you by 1010, which is a capsule collection of diamond rings that are responsibly sourced, limited edition designs at fair price points, and it's an exclusive collection of 10

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by searching the words 10 by 10 only at blue nile.com. All right, welcome back to this episode of the Locktime Penguins podcast. I'm your host, Hunter Hodes. You know, to follow me on Twitter at Hunter Hodes. Follow the show's Twitter at L.O underscore Penguins. A couple more thoughts from Sunday's game before I switched to Saturday's game. Jeff Carter, again, looked awesome for the Penguins. He's been on the ice for a lot more shot attempts for than shot attempts against,

especially for scoring chances as well. his first, what, three to four games have been rock, solid. I think I retweeted a tweet today. Yeah, from Shari Irving of Penn's blog. It's been three games, but when Jeff Carter is on the ice, the Penguins 5E5 course share is 65.9%. The Penguins 5E5 expected goals for share, 67%, and he's been on the ice for two goals for,

and two goals against that data is via evolving hockey, but Danny had a great graph with it. So, yeah, Carter's been really good. since coming over from Los Angeles, and I don't think it's going to be too long before we do see him get his first goal in a penguin uniform. But I thought he was a bright spot yesterday. Casey DeSmith, I thought he was fine. Definitely wasn't his best game. You know, his shut out streak against the Sabres ended up breaking just 26 seconds into the game. And, you know, you knew it was going to be a long day for the penguin, especially after that emotional win on Saturday, when they gave up a goal with not even

basically 30 seconds into the game. It was like, well, you know, it's basically just going to be one of those games. as you know, Adam Gretz also tweeted that out, I think 30 minutes into regulation. You know, basically just look like, yeah, it's one of those days for the Penguins where your team doesn't have it. Every team goes through that, and that's exactly what happened in this one. Said, you know, uncharacteristic, like I said, missing that wide open, empty net. Gensel kind of uncharacteristically bad day from him as well. Brian Russ, same with him. Nice to see Teddy Bliger get back on the score sheet.

I do think the team will need a little more from Zach Gashon-Rees. I know he hasn't scored in a bit, but his underwronging numbers are still very strong. I think he's going to continue to I think get better, you know, especially as hopefully Brandon Tannov comes back by the playoffs. As for some other players, I thought Pedersen struggled again. I think he played that Ryan Harkle. I think it was

a second one. Just bad positioning there. I really don't know what he was doing on that one. I think that's really it for Sunday's game. I guess going to Saturday's game, what a first period it was for the Penguins. That was probably their best first period. I think I've seen them play all season. Yes, I understand

it is against the Sabres, but you know, as I talked about, the Sabres have been really good, these last 10 to 11 games, and they've been beating a lot of the top teams in the East Division. So yeah, this is not the same Sabres team that the Penguins destroyed for four games when Ralph Kruger was the head coach when they literally had no life in them. But other stuff from the Saturday game, Jared McCann gets his 12th goal of the season. Again, he's been a completely different player this year. I understand he's shooting percentages around 14 to 15%. But just look at his vision, look at his ability to get to the high danger areas. His playmaking ability is to defend.

plays in the defensive zone. It's been a complete 180 this year for McCann. And yes, I am on board the hashtag extend Jared McCann. He deserves to stay here for many years to come. He is a great complimentary player for this team. And I'm really excited to see what he can do for the rest of the season and into the playoffs. And for next year as well as, yes, he is still signed for one more year on that current contract. Jeff Carter in that game was also good again.

He's getting close to scoring. I feel it's coming really soon. It was also nice to see Evan Rodriguez get a goal against his former team. I've really liked Rodriguez's game the last three to four weeks. His underlying numbers have been strong. He's playing both zones has been strong. I've really never understood why some people in this fan base talked down on him really bad and think, like, oh, yeah, you can't have this guy in the

playoff lineup. He sucks. He does nothing. I'm like, I think he's a perfectly fine 12th board for this team. Yes, I get it. Radim Zohorna has been nice. in that small sample. But if you're asking me right now between which two of those I would want in a 70 game series,

I am going to take Evan Rodriguez. I think he is a perfectly fine bottom six player. If you put him down there, like I said, it's okay. He's not playing in the top six with Cindy Crosby and Jake Gensel. That was a stupid decision from Mike Sullivan. He deserved to get criticized for that. But, you know, this is a different world now where he's actually getting zone time in the bottom six. doing the most with it, like I said, with his production.

You know, maybe at times he should shoot a little bit more. But overall, these last three weeks, I've really liked his game. And he does deserve to be the 12th forward on this team when everyone is healthy. So good on him to get that goal. And then, of course, Brian Russ gets another goal for this season. I think that is now tied for the team lead, excuse me, in goals with Jake Gensel. Rust has just been outstanding this season for Pittsburgh. I mean, I've talked about Brian Russ on this podcast.

way too many times now. He has one of the best valued contracts in the league, not just on the team, everyone, but in the league. His ability to get to the high danger area, especially on the power play and score at will, is something to behold, and I've really liked his game this season, especially coming after last season, where he led the team in goals with 27.

People were a bit skeptical that he could, I guess, continue that kind of production, even in a shortened season, but he has done that, and then some of the season he's turned into one of the best goals scores. on this team. And like I said, everyone, he's making three and a half million per on that contract. Now, if he were to hit the open market after this season, he would probably command well over five million per season. That is how good Brian Rust has been these last two seasons. So again, really nice game from him. I thought it was a good game from Cindy Crosby as well.

Crystal Tang played a final game. Tristan Jari, I thought was fine. I didn't like that first goal that he gave up, especially after the Penguins took a 2-0 lead on Buffalo. I think Tage Thompson had his fourth goal in his last six games. But Jari was a little too aggressive, I thought, there, which allowed the five-hole to open up a little bit, as I think he kind of overplayed that. I think the second goal was just the victim of the Penguins penalty kill being bad. And yeah, let's just talk about the Penguins penalty kill. I'm not going to go full in depth on it. Jesse Marshall of the Athletic did a great 11-minute video on his YouTube channel that I retweeted yesterday on my Twitter.

If you want to see what a video breakdown looks like when it comes to the Penguins P-K, I highly suggest you to check out that video on his YouTube channel. They do something what he likes to call a wedge plus one. It's basically like a triangle, three players protecting the high danger in the slot areas, and then the plus one, of course, is at the point just basically trying to cause havoc. But the big thing in there that Jayce talks about is that, you know, they're just, they're missing their defensive assignment. So definitely go check out that video. Like I've said all along, there's a lot of puck watching in that wedge plus one system.

They're not getting the players out of the net front area. they're just losing a lot of their defensive assignment at times, as I just said, which is leading to a lot of goals against on the PK. Obviously, you would love if your goalie would help you out a bit, but even in a lot of these circumstances, Tristan Jari or Casey Smith, can basically only watch as they are, like I said, they are just getting no help. So the Penguins PK continues to be a disaster. I think Dan Hopper of his site tweeted this out during the game on Saturday.

If the Penguins continue to get this kind of penalty killing from their PK unit, it is going to be a tough watch in the playoffs whenever they go shorthand just because they've shown an inability to kill penalties on a consistent basis this year. I think that is their biggest problem right now with this team is that their PK is so bad. But, you know, they can still win with a top 10 powerplay. You know, the power play has been really good these last week or four weeks,

but you still want the PK to be better than, you know, in the bottom third of the league, which is where it's been basically all season. So they got to clean a lot of this up during their last, 11 games as the playoffs. Like I said, there's only 19 days left in the regular season, and the playoffs are basically three and a half weeks away. So yeah, they have a lot to clean up when it comes to this unit. Otherwise, I thought Jari was perfectly fine, and that game was another solid star for him. His puck handling abilities are still pretty shitty. He's got to clean that up, but all in all, a good start from Jari, and a nice win by the Penguins.

Buffalo really made them earn that win in those last 90 seconds. They had some really nice zone time on that six and five. There was a couple really nice plays that I liked from the Penguins, especially when it came to Teddy Bluger, that awesome chip off the wall got out of the zone, I think with less than 30 seconds left, which almost solidified the win. Well, but basically did solidify the win. I know the Sabres had a couple face-offs with about 15, 10 seconds left in the game, but Bluger basically saved the day there with that awesome chip out of the zone where the Savers had to regroup for a bit. But that was about the best I've seen the Penguins to Vend a six on five all year and was nice to get that one.

win overall. But still, a little more to get to for this episode of the Lockdown Hanglons podcast. We are going to preview the three-game series against the Devils a little bit in the next segment. I'm actually going to have a crossover episode tomorrow with the Lockdown Devils host, who of course is Stray Matthews. He does a great job over there covering a team that is pretty bad. And, you know, their off-season is going to get started pretty quickly here. So I kind of feel for him that he's going to have to do five episodes a week with a team that there's not going to be a lot to talk about, that's for sure. But, okay, Before we do get to that next segment, it's time to talk about Bill Bar. There's 18 amazing

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at L.O. Oner Sword Penguins. I did say in that last ad read that college basketball is in full swing. No, it obviously is not, but the NBA and NHL are obviously in full swing, but still go to bed online.ag for that promotion. But yes, big week coming up for the Penguins right now. three against the devils that will be their final three times that they play the devils this season. For whatever reason, the devil's just love to give the penguins fits. I don't know what it is. They just play hard against Pittsburgh. And I know Pittsburgh is three and one and one against them,

but they've had to work very hard in those three wins. You know, I remember that game that was the six to four game. That was a five to two, I think four to one game at one point. And the devil's almost tied that game late in the third period. That is just how hard they were playing. And the other one that was 5-2. Pittsburgh was more in control of that one from start to finish. But in that 6-4-1, and then the other one that they won in Newark.

They also lost in Pittsburgh in overtime to end their previous three-game series against the Devils. They actually lost two of those three games. One of them was in Newark. One of them was in Pittsburgh to go one-in-one-and-one or one-and-two against them. But still, really nice to get those last two wins against them to get to basically three-and-two on the season against them. If you go to daily face-off and you look at their line combinations, Kukinen, Jack Hughes, and Sarangovich is their top line, Hughes, needs no explanation.

He's the former number and overall pick. I've said it on this podcast before. I think there's going to be a mini-McKinnon breakout with him coming soon. I've really liked his game this season, and you just got to surround him with more help. Sarenkovic, I think, is turning into a nice player. It is good to see Nico Heeshire back in the lineup, just because he's been banged up so much this season.

I think he's one of their, obviously he's one of their better players, but I think he's their best defensive forward on this team. Andreas Johnson is their second-line left-winger, Miles Wood. He's still a damn good player. I would love to have Miles Wood on the Penguins any day of the week. Nick Merkley, Nolan Foote, I think he was just called up to the main squad, if I'm not mistaken. So it would be curious to see how he plays against Pittsburgh in those three games.

He's been a pretty highly touted player. For the defense, Ty Smith, he's a stud. I would love to have Ty Smith. on the penguins. It's nice to see PKK having a little bit of a bounce back year. Ryan Murray is still there, Damon Severson. And then end goal, I think it is going to be McKenzie Blackwood for

all three games. Scott Wedgwood is the backup. I know Aaron Dell started in the game against the Rangers, but I think that game was a back-to-back. Like I said, we're probably going to see Mackenzie Blackwood for those three games against the penguins. And then for Pittsburgh, with their goal-tending, I think you're going to see Jari go on Tuesday. You're going to see him go on Thursday.

and because the penguins have a back-to-back on Saturday Sunday, you're probably going to see Casey DeSmith go up against the Devils on Saturday before starting Jari against the Bruins on Sunday. And yes, everyone, the penguins do have another two afternoon matinee games this coming weekend. I know it has been their nemesis for a lot of the season, but, you know, some of the playoff games are afternoon games, so they better start playing well on afternoon games, or, you know, they're going to be kind of up a creek as the playoffs come closer.

But overall, like I said, this should be six points for the Penguins as they want to secure a playoff spot. If they are able to win these three games, they wouldn't get to six in one and one or six and two against the Devils this season, which would be obviously awesome. You know, getting 11 combined wins thus far versus the Sabres and Devils is a big boost to your playoff chances. And you combine that with the Rangers, that would be 17 of your wins against three teams that are on the outside looking in. That would just be ginormous for the Penguins' playoff chances. watch to see if Kaspari Kappan Potentially comes back this week. I know Ron Hextal said he's about 10 to 14 days away.

As of this recording, he said that last Monday. So we could see him back later this week or we could see him back a week from today. But I think Casperi Kappen is getting close to making a return. And as for Malkin, I'm not really sure, but it is getting close to the point where, you know, time is of the essence for him to make his return before the playoffs to be. And as Ron Hextall said, I do not believe Brandon Tanniv is going to be coming back. you know always got to look out for jack hugh sarongovich ty smith hopefully mackenzie blackwood doesn't turn on a heater and if the penguins take care of business as they have thus far against the devils

this season um this will be a very successful week as like i said this will be the first three games of a five game homestand for the penguins as they have seven of their final 11 games at pbjp jane's but that'll do it for this episode of the podcast i really appreciate all of you listening to this one tomorrow's episode like i said it'll be the crossover with tray matthews of locked on devils and then I will have a recap of the first game against the Devils on Wednesday before the Thursday episode, which will be recapping the game from Thursday after the game, and then Friday, it'll be probably previewing the game on Saturday, but also maybe doing a Bruins game preview as they play them on Sunday then on Tuesday.

But like I said, thank you all so much for listening to this one, and I'll talk to you all tomorrow.